Scarred to the Core
by Wingman1995
Summary: Applecore comes to Ponyville to live with his cousin Applejack. There he meets Scar, a Pegasus who lives in the Everfree forest. Their adventures will put them face to face with the greatest evil Equestria has ever faced. Rated M for violence, launguages and sexual terms (no clop)
1. Chapter 1 Introduction

**Chapter 1: Introduction**

**Update 12 of March 2014: I have put the 3 first chapter together as one long one. Enjoy.**

* * *

"There he is!"

"Get him!"

"We did it!"

"What the hell is that?!"

"No! How can he still be-"

The train whistle woke Applecore up from his nightmare. He has had the same dream for weeks now and hopes that spending some time with his cousins in Ponyville will make the bad dreams go away. His dark brown mane hung down the left side of his face halfway down his green eyes and his bright red coat was covered in sweat. Looking out of the train window, all he worried about was how ponies would react to his cutie mark; a pentagram. But upon seeing his cousins Applejack and Big Macintosh with three little fillies he had heard about from his little sister Babs Seed, all his worries washed away.

_Meanwhile in the Everfree forest_

A young Pegasus had just woken up when an unbelievable amount of pain shocked through his body. His face and light grey coat was covered in scars from his numerous run-ins with the animals of the Everfree forest over the many years of living in the cursed forest. His mane was short and messy, not having been properly washed in so long, and midnight black. His right eye was missing, torn out yesterday and the cause of the pain. But what was the most peculiar thing about him was his cutie mark; an inverted pentagram. The Pegasus had taken to call himself Scar as that is all he sees himself as; a scar on the face of the world. As he got himself ready for another hard day he looked off in the distance and saw the nearby town of Ponyville. He had never set foot in the town but for some time he has seen a zebra enter the town and return to a hut in the forest, sometimes he even saw a little earth pony filly go into the hut. He knew that he had no other choice but to enter the town, his missing eye was worse than any injury he has ever sustained before and needed to be properly treated.

"Well, here goes nothing. I just hope I can get the necessary medical treatment without too much problem." And with those words, Scar started walking to Ponyville.

* * *

Scar moved towards Ponyville when he passed an apple farm. On his way to the little town he had discovered that his injuries were worse than he thought. When he tried to fly he discovered that he was bleeding under his right wing and he could hardly move his left one and his right eye socket was bleeding. He had walked aimlessly for a while and somehow ended up next to the farm. Thinking that he could get some medical supplies to at least stop his bleeding, he had started heading that way. But one of the downsides with missing an eye was that it becomes difficult to accurately judge distances and now he was at the point of collapsing from the loss of blood. He had just arrived at the entrées to the farm when his body became too heavy for him to support and he fell down. As darkness started to claim him his final thoughts went to the Pegasus he had looked up to when he still lived in Cloudsdale.

"Rainbow Dash…" And with those words, his left eye closed and he lost consciousness.

* * *

Applecore was shocked to say the least. First he got to meet his cousin's friends, one of them a princess, found out that his cousin Apple bloom and her two friends started the Cutie Mark Crusaders that his sister was part of and to top it all, a Pegasus covered in scars and bleeding to death had passed out in front of the farm. Applejack and her friends wasted no time getting the Pegasus to the hospital with Princess Twilight Sparkle teleporting them there. Applecore took Apple Bloom and her friends inside with Big Mac and put his suitcase in one of the spare rooms.

"Who was that Pegasus? And why do I feel like I'm supposed to know him?" All the questions plagued his mind until he made his decision. "Hey Big Mac I'm going to hospital to check up on the girls and that Pegasus!"

And so Applecore ran to the hospital, stopping to ask some ponies the way, and arrived at the hospital after about two hours. He heard from his cousin's friend Fluttershy that the grey Pegasus was stable and resting up. He also heard from another of his cousin's friends, Rainbow Dash, that the Pegasus was missing his right eye. When Applecore noticed the depressed looks in the two Pegasi eyes he grew concerned about what had them in such a depressed mood. Applejack told him that the Pegasus had taken severe damage to the joints in his wings and that it would be a miracle if he would be able to fly ever again.

When Applecore saw the Pegasus his heart sank. There where all kinds of medical equipment surrounding the Pegasus like heart monitors, tubes that connected to bags of blood, bandages around his wings and a medical eye patch over his right eye.

* * *

A beeping sound and distant voices started registering in Scar's head.

"His wounds have healed faster than we thought. He's one lucky Pegasus to have friends like you ponies." A distant voice said. "But his injuries are still pretty bad. His right eye is missing as well as some skin tissue around the area so he will always need to have the eye patch on. Not to mention his wings! Most of the muscles in his wings are torn beyond our ability to help. I don't think he will ever fly again."

As the world started to clear up for Scar he felt how something warm was going through his body. He also felt the eye patch the voice from earlier was talking about. But as he felt the contracting feeling of the bandage he started to feel himself panicking, memories from the past returning.

As the girls were talking amongst themselves to try and figure out what happened to the Pegasus in the hospital bed, Applecore noticed how the Pegasus breathing started to pick up like he was panicking.

* * *

As Scar's breathing became shallower, his heart rate started picking up, making the heart monitor go crazy. This got the attention of every pony in the room and the doctor, a brown earth pony in a doctor's robe, started shouting orders to the nurses. A crash cart was brought in but before anypony could use it, Scar's left eye shot open and he jumped of the bed.

"Stay the hell away from me! I'm not some tool you can use for your own amusement!" he shouted and surprised everypony in the room. When Twilight tried to get close to him he stated to back away until he hit a wall. His eye showed that he was beyond contact. "Don't think for a second that I will hesitate to kill you damn it! Stay the buck away! Just leave me alone!" In the middle of his shouting, his right eye started to bleed but, what surprised Applecore was that tears started run down Scar's left eye as he feel down on the floor, burrowing his head under his hoofs. "Please… I just want to be alone… that's why I started living in Everfree… Please."

"You live in the Everfree forest?!" One of Applejacks friends, Rarity, exclaimed.

Applecore surprised everypony when he when over to Scar as he was lying down on the floor.

"My name is Applecore. These are my cousin Applejack's friends, Twilight Sparkles, Pinkie Pie, Rarity, Fluttershy and Rainbow Dash. What's your name?" When Applecore introduced him and the girls, Scar lay still on the floor but his ears peaked up upon hearing Rainbow's name. He slowly removed his hoofs from his face, stood up and studied the stallion in front of him.

"I go by the name of Scar. I have been living in Everfree for most of my life and gotten along just fine so I don't need anypony to look after me. Now if you will excuse me, I have a forest to return to." But as soon as Scar started to move, a huge amount of pain shot through his sides making him drop down to the floor, holding his sides as he started coughing up blood.

"You can't go back to Everfree like that, you'll die!" Applecore took a deep breath before continuing. "Maybe you can stay with one of the girl? Would that be OK with any of you?" Applecore turned to the girls with a hopeful expression.

The girls looked amongst each other for a while as Scar carefully stood up. After a while, Twilight stepped forward.

"He can stay with me and Spike at the library. It's still and quiet so you can get the rest you need Scar." Scar merely turned his head to the side so everypony was looking at his eye patch.

"Not like you ponies are giving me much of a choice. Fine, I'll stay with the alicorn at the library. But as soon as I heal up, I'm going back to the forest." Applecore's mood brightened when he heard Scar say that and so they all started walking towards the library Twilight lived.

* * *

On the way there, Applecore noticed the looks of confusion and even fear they got. Ponies started to run into their homes or back away when the group got close. Applecore looked at Scar to see him sending angry and hateful looks at the residents of Ponyville.

It didn't take long for the group to reach the library, something Applecore was happy about. Scar had a hateful look in his eye the whole way and kept mumbling about how he can't be weak in front of somepony. When they all arrived at the library Applecore got to meet Spike, a baby dragon.

"The guest bedroom is right here on the first floor. If you want- Hey wait up!" As soon as Twilight had told Scar where the spare bed was, Scar started moving towards the bedroom door. He turned his head so the ponies and dragon could see the anger in his eye before he disappeared into the bedroom and closed the door.

It was getting late, so the girls agreed to meet up in the morning at a place called Sugarcube Corner and everypony started heading home. When Applecore and Applejack got back to the farm everypony else was already asleep so the two ponies decided to go to sleep. But Applecore's thought kept going back to Scar and after an hour of turning in his bed he finally fell asleep.

* * *

**A/N: Thank you all for reading this far into the story. I hope that you enjoyed it so far. The chapters will wary in length and I will try my hardest to write good chapters for you guys. See you guy's next chapter of when the girls and Applecore try to make Scar open up about himself. Bye**


	2. Chapter 2 Opening up

**Chapter 2: Opening up**

"Kill that fucker!"

"We're trying to Sir!"

_What are these voices talking about? And where are the ponies speaking? Why is everything so dark?_

Scar woke up in the guestroom in the library. His sides ached and the spot where his right eye used to be hurt worst of all. But despite the pain, he kept a straight face as he got out of bed. He walked over to the door and was just about to open it when he heard voices on the other side. He pressed his ear to the door in order to listen in on the conversation happening in the main room.

"Are you sure this is such a good idea Twilight? He doesn't seem like the kind of pony you want to get mad at you." Scar furrowed his eyebrows at the sound of the dragon but quickly recoiled from the pain that came with doing that. Before he could get back to eavesdropping, the door opened to reveal Twilight standing in the doorway facing away from him.

"Calm down Spike, I'm sure that he won't mind if we wake him up for some lunch." As soon as she said that she looked in front of herself and came face to face with Scar. The shock from seeing him so close made her freeze in place. She noticed that his crimson eye was sending her an icy glare. But she also noticed that behind the icy glare, there seemed to be a great amount of sadness. "Um… good morning Scar… lunch is ready… if you want any." Twilight managed to stumble out because even if she saw the sadness behind his eye, the glare that was fixed on her was still intimidating enough to make her tremble.

Scar kept his glare fixed on Twilight before he walked past her into the kitchen, passing a shaking Spike on the way. As he got into the kitchen, he noticed that there were two sandwiches at the table. He picked one up and started to eat before realizing he had lowered his guard and, according to himself, shown weakness in front of another creature, even if it's a baby dragon and another pony. Putting the half eaten sandwich down, he looked over at the alicorn before speaking.

"So what are you and your _friends_ going to do to convince me to be your friend?" the amount of venom that slipped out at the mention of her friends made Twilight recoil. "You're all obviously a bunch of friendship lovers so don't try to act ignorant to what I'm saying. So, what's your pathetic attempt going to be?"

"Well…" Twilight started, trying to look like the glare she was receiving wasn't scaring her. "We are all going to Sugarcube Corner, you can come along if you want to but we all understand if you rather stay here." She finished with a smile.

Scar looked at her for a minute in disbelief as nopony had ever asked him what he wanted. He studied the mare for a minute before he realized something. He didn't want to hurt her and her smiling made him feel warm inside. Giving an almost invisible smile, he made up his mind.

"Well… you are letting me stay here so I might as well see if there is any chance in hell that I won't try to kill any of you ponies." Scar saw that his words might had the desired effect as he saw Spike go wide-eyed before starting to shake. But even then, Twilight kept her smile.

"Great! Let's go then, Sugarcube Corner isn't far from here!" And with that, she turned around and left the library with Scar and Spike following her.

* * *

_At Sugarcube Corner_

* * *

Applecore was helping Rarity set up the decorations for Scars welcome party. Everypony had agreed that it was a bad idea to invite too many ponies to attend after how Scar reacted to other ponies yesterday. Applecore even managed to make Pinkie Pie, who was in the kitchen baking a cake, not to make it a surprise party as he didn't want Scar to hurt anypony in a self-defense reaction.

"Well darling," Applecore turned his head to look at Rarity for calling him darling. "I must say you are full of surprises. First you manage to convince Pinkie not to make it a surprise party for that poor Pegasus. Then you manage to make this place look simply divine." Applecore blushed at how a beautiful mare was giving him a compliment as that never happened back in Manehattan.

"Yeah it's going to be nice meeting this pony as all we got to see was him on the ground last time!" Rarity's sister, Sweetie Belle, exclaimed while jumping around with a spark coming out of her horn.

Applecore softened his expression and looked at Sweetie Belle with his grey eyes. "Well he didn't seem like the kind of pony who you should startle. And when you consider that he has been living in the Everfree Forest for at least some part of his live, he probably knows how to fight pretty well."

Applecore looked around until he noticed Rainbow seemingly lost in thought. He decided to talk a little with her as from what he heard from his cousin, it's a pretty rare occurrence. And so he walked over to her.

"Rainbow Dash is something wrong?" His question startled the cyan Pegasus.

"Huh? Yeah Applecore, everything's fine. It's just, I feel like I've seen that Pegasus before but I can't remember where." Rainbow looked down to the floor and tried to figure out how she could possibly know Scar.

Applecore gave her an understanding look before speaking. "I know what you mean Rainbow, I feel like I should know him to. But don't feel bad about not recognizing him; he is covered in scars so it would be difficult. Just give it some time."

As Applecore finished, Pinkie came bouncing up to the two ponies. Her wide smile faded a little when she saw the two ponies were looking down.

"Come on guys! We still need to prepare a lot of things for the party! Applecore, will you help me?" the pink pony said excitedly.

Applecore chuckled at Pinkies hyper nature and when into the kitchen to finish up the treats and talked for a bit.

* * *

It didn't take Scar, Spike and Twilight long to reach the bakery. As soon as Scar walked in he saw all the ponies from yesterday alongside the CMC. There was a cake, cupcakes, cookies, games and a big banner saying '_Welcome to Ponyville Scar_'. When Scar saw the big party these ponies were throwing him, he felt a strange kind of warmth in his chest.

The party went smoothly; Scar got to learn more about Twilights friends. But even so, he still kept his guard up as his past had taught him that nopony does something nice for no reason. At one point during the party, Apple bloom asked Scar about his numerous scars, with earned her an icy glare from him. But that was quickly resolved when Applejack scolded Apple Bloom about not asking personal questions to a pony she didn't even know.

* * *

The party lasted until late at night. Scar had gotten comfortable enough around the girls and Applecore to relax a little. After the party ended everypony said goodnight, except Scar, and started to head home. Spike had fallen asleep at some point and so Twilight had to carry him on her back.

When they arrived back at the library, Scar went straight towards the door to the guest bedroom.

"Goodnight Scar." Twilight didn't expect an answer so she was shocked at what she heard next.

"Goodnight… Twilight." Before she could turn around, the door to Scars room closed. After standing there for a while, she smiled and went off to bed.


	3. Chapter 3 The Dream

**Chapter 3: The Dream**

Applecore opened his eyes and looked around. He was in an unfamiliar room; it had a couch, table, TV and a staircase leading to a second floor.

"Where the hay is this?" As soon as he said that, he heard a female scream at the top of her lungs from the second floor. He rushed upstairs to find himself in a hallway with two doors on either side of him. As he was thinking about with door to open first, he heard a small boy crying. He ran to the door on his left side and bucked it open. What he saw caused him to freeze in horror. Blood covered the walls and the decapitated head of an unknown creature was staring right at him. Then, blood splattered on the floor in front of him. Tearing his stare from the head on the floor, he found himself gazing at the source of the crying he heard before. Another creature like the decapitated one, only this looked like a small child, dropped down onto the floor with its throat torn out. His gaze traveled upwards, holding a look of sheer fear of what he was going to find. He saw a creature that stood on its hind legs, arms covered in blood. But what scared Applecore the most was its face; snakelike, piercing, blue eyes, long, white hair with black highlights and a wide smile showing sharp, fanglike teeth. The creature opened its mouth and a dark, echoing voice came out without its mouth moving.

"You wanted to know my name child? My name is Legion; for we are MANY!" as the creature shouted the final word, the world around Applecore started to turn dark.

Applecore woke up when he hit the floor. After recovering from falling out of his bed, he remembered what happened the day before. After he and Applejack got home, he went right to sleep. Then he remembered the nightmare he had. It was clearer then the once he had before, but what he had seen still made him want to puke. He had heard in Manehattan that you only see creatures in your dreams that you have seen in real life but he had never seen something like those creatures before in his life. Then he heard a knock on the door.

"Are you ok Applecore? We heard some noise." It was his cousin Big Mac.

"I'm ok Big Mac! I'll be down for breakfast in a second!"

"Just don't take too long. We still have work that needs to get done." And with that, Big Mac left went downstairs.

After taking some time to recover from the nightmare, Applecore headed downstairs and into the kitchen for breakfast. After eating and telling his family that the noise they heard was him falling out of bed, he went outside to buck apples with Applejack. They bucked apples until about noon and headed inside for lunch.

"Hey Applejack" Applejack looked over her salad at her cousin. "I'm going over to the library to check up on Scar and ask Twilight about something. Are you coming with me?"

"Sorry Applecore, but I can't. Still some work to get done here. But you can go, just tell Twi I said hi." Applecore nodded to his cousin, said goodbye and started heading to the library.

_Meanwhile in-between worlds_

In a pure white room with nothing but a blood red throne in the center sat a male, humanlike creature. He was dressed in a white muscle shirt under a grey trench coat, blue jeans and red sneakers. On his head he wore a black fedora with a white feather sticking up on both sides of it. His white hair almost reached all the way down his back. His snakelike, blue eyes were empty of all life. His left arm ended with a stump but, black smoke was coming out of it and slowly reconstructing his hand. His mouth opened, showing his fanglike teeth, and a dark, echoing voice came out without his lips moving.

"They are the prey…And you are the hunter…"

_The library_

Scar woke up with a start. As he sat up in bed, he felt how his head was hurting like never before. He tried to remember what his dream was about but was met with a huge amount of pain. He slowly got out of bed and made his way towards the door. As he opened it, his vision was met with Twilight lying on the floor with books all around her. She had one in her magic grip and her full focus was on reading. Scar tiptoed his way through the books and into the kitchen where he saw Spike washing some dishes. He also saw a bowl with some apples in it. Scar walked over to the bowl and took out an apple and started to silently eat it. He finished all the apples in record time and started to move towards his room. Just as he reached it, the front door opened and Applecore walked in.

"Hey Twilight, hope I'm not intruding but I need to ask you something. Oh! I see you're up Scar." Twilight looked up from the book she was reading and turned her head to look at Scar who was staring at Applecore with an annoyed look. She was just about to speak when Spike walked in, carrying the empty apple bowl.

"You know Twilight, if you wanted some apples, you could've just asked me to bring them in. And you didn't have to eat all of them." He said with a frown on his face.

"But I didn't eat any apples Spike. I've been in here reading since this morning." Twilight said while looking at the dragon with a questioning look.

"Well they were behind me the whole time so nopony could have eaten them in the kitchen without me noticing. So the only logical explanation it for you to have used you magic to grab them while I was washing the dishes."

"Well you could have eaten them in the kitchen. I think I have good enough control of my magic not to grab something without noticing." As Applecore was watching Twilight and Spike argue about who eat the apples, he looked over at Scar and saw him smiling an amused smile. As soon as Scar noticed Applecore looking at him, the smile was replaced with his usual angry scowl.

"Hey guys." Everypony turned their attention to Applecore. "I'm sure this thing about the apples is important but I still need to speak with Twilight." Spike returned into the kitchen, Twilight put the book she was reading next to her and Scar stayed by the door, wanting to hear what this was about as well. Applecore told Twilight about the dream he had, leaving out the gory details. Twilight thought about what she had been told before speaking up.

"I've never heard or read anything about a creature like the one you described Applecore. And I don't know what this 'Legion' is either. Sorry I can't be of help." Applecore's ears flopped a little when he heard that. He was just about to apologize for the intrusion and leave when a voice stopped him.

"Military." Everypony turned to look at Scar with questioning looks on their faces. "A legion is a military unit, made up of 5400 soldiers. You said this creature claimed to 'be many'. Made it absorbs the spirits of what it kills."

The room went quiet for a long while, the two ponies just stared at Scar with wide eyes and while it didn't show, it made him more than a little uncomfortable.

"Well it's better than any theory I would've come up with." Applecore said with a shrug of his shoulders. With that settled, Scar turned to head into his room when Applecore called out to him. "Hey Scar, I only came by to ask about that dream. But maybe you would like to see the farm? You were in pretty bad shape the last time you were there." Scar only looked at Applecore with a look that questioned the red earth pony's sanity. "You know that if you don't, my cousin will check in on you with all her friends." Applecore grew a victorious smile when he saw Scars eye widen at the thought at having to deal with more ponies.

"You arrogant, smug, son of a… fine, I'll follow you to the farm." Scar spoke through gritted teeth and with a murderous glare. And with that the two stallions left Twilight at the library and started walking towards the farm, Scar keeping his glare fixed on Applecore. After a while of walking, Applecore finally had enough of Scar glaring at him and he turned around with a frown.

"OK, spill it." The two stopped walking and Scars glare turned into a confused frown. "There is obviously something annoying you so tell me what it is."

Scar raised a hoof and pointed at Applecore's cutie mark. "What is it suppose to mean? How did you get it?"

"Faust knows what this mark means. I was born with it." Applecore spoke with a shrug of his shoulders. Scars eye widened upon hearing this piece of information "What about yours? What does that mean?" Scars look returned to a more casual one but the astonishment what clear in his voice.

"How in the name of Tartaros would I to know? This cursed mark has been on me since the day I brought into this wretched world." The silence that followed the two ponies was so tense; one could hear a worm eating through an apple.


End file.
